This article was published on January 17, 2013

Cisco invests in virtualisation specialist Parallels to boost its cloud and datacenter solutions


Cisco invests in virtualisation specialist Parallels to boost its cloud and datacenter solutions

Hosting and cloud service enablement firm Parallels has announced today that networking equipment manufacturer Cisco has made an equity investment in the company, which will support a number of joint go-to-market products designed to deliver “industry-leading cloud service delivery capabilities”.

It’s hoped that the investment, which is an undisclosed sum, will improve the collaboration between the two companies and also the adoption of both the cloud service delivery products designed by Parallels, as well as cloud and data center infrastructure solutions built by Cisco.

The two firms say that they will also expand the development, marketing and industry initatives that they work on together as a result of the new equity investment announced today.

Hilton Romanski, Vice president of Corporate Business Development at Cisco, said: “In collaboration with Parallels, we are focused on offering a more efficient and easier-to-use cloud services delivery model for service providers. We are particularly excited about Parallels global presence — including its operations in Russia — which affords Cisco a continued opportunity to fuel innovation there and around the world.”

Founded in 1999, Parallels is a world leader not only in hosting and cloud service enablement, but also desktop virtualization. This range of software, built both for businesses and the wider public, allows consumers to easily run and use applications from a number of different operating systems, including Windows and Mac, without rebooting.

As an example, Parallels Mobile enables users to run both Mac apps and Windows software from a number of mobile devices including the iPad, iPhone or iPod touch.

“Parallels is committed to enabling our service provider customers to offer the most comprehensive, seamless and flexible set of cloud services for their SMB end-users,” said Birger Steen, CEO of Parallels. “By strengthening our collaboration with Cisco, Parallels is focused on accelerating its growth and offering an end-to-end solution for cloud service providers.”

Image Credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

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